AWARD FOR THE BEST GRADUATE „THESIS“ (WORK OF ART)

To long for something so strongly, knowing that in spite of all possible impatience and hard work it is what we have to get to instantly.

These are the words, I would use to describe paintings and the whole working atmosphere we come across with Lena Kramaric. She recognised working material on the road, in the magazine, talking to people, browsing the fairy tale or watching the movie, she wants a new canvas and be assured she wants it now. She is impatient, grabs a pencil, gets the brushes out and squeezes the paint out. The first sketches are already there.

This cacophony in pencil transforms itself into strongly shaded paintings that definitely leave a lasting impression on you. All are painted on the big format (100x150) and they tell the stories in their own right.

Each painting bears several important components such as line, colour and the group of bodies. They are well intertwined. However, due to their vivacity they can live comfortably one without other.

The line is advancing, it's dynamic and at the end it closes up a shape or a certain body. As it is so dynamic, the line is simply throwing itself into arms of other lines and shapes. She is the master of the composition and it determines the painting's movement. Then the colour comes onto the scene and it creates space and harmony achieved by the mixture of the shades of hot and cold ones. Then it goes to shock you and leaves you with a strange bitter taste in the mouth with shark contrast colours in different shapes. The colour in Lena's pieces of artwork has a multipurpose function. Somewhere it represents a stage with the figures on it and then at times it acts as a background drop where the shapes lean on or simply become its intrinsic part. However, there are times where it is in the function of figures' division zone as they tend to attract to each other because of their colors richness in texture and their vivacity. It is the colour what gives these paintings life, expression and it draws us to it because of its mesmerising effect and boldness, although a great deal of attention was paid to blend it with its teinures and complex pairs.

The group of figures is dominating the canvas, with their size, line and no sense approach. No sense approach? Bodies hurdled together, in their imperfect forms, somewhat decomposing, have come together in order to keep themselves alive, not to loose their identity-part of its inner self. Are they part of someone's dream or are they dancing or are they there for the sake of being there, intertwined for someone's pleasure, it's hard to say.

As I have said earlier Lena Kramarić finds inspiration in small things, things that you come across in everyday life and sometimes like a child in a toyshop's window, she reaches out to grab that one toy she wants to own. She paints with a degree of anguish though vividly and not forgetting the humour as she awaits patiently for the end result. She is not afraid of change so during the course of her work she often changes ideas, generates new ones, gets rid of the stuff she dislikes and with a dose of courage paints something else. She does not crave for big words with ambiguous meaning full of superlatives. She demands honesty. A quiet moment next to the painting as well as a moment of laughter.

Award for the best graduate“ thesis“ (work of art). What award. A golden bowl or what? Who is givning it to whom?

What we all expect is that the final piece of wok at the end of her art studies will be her masterpiece. Is that really the case or is it our desired outcome? Lena Kramarić has demonstrated through her exibition that this does not matter to ourselves nor to somebody else hence her exibition is innocent, full of colour, youthful enthusiasm and even child's anger. The award could be the fact that Lena is here and has offered to her nearest and dearest her inner feelings, has revealed her ways of entertainment as well as her moments of solitude, in her thoughts contemplating about her inner self.

Lucija Švob